


Starve a Fever

by edgarallanrose



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Ficlet, First Kiss, M/M, Mother Hen John, One Shot, Sick Sherlock, Sickfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-04
Updated: 2016-03-04
Packaged: 2018-05-24 15:52:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,417
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6158749
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/edgarallanrose/pseuds/edgarallanrose
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock has the flu and John is a doctor, dammit, what is he supposed to do?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Starve a Fever

**Author's Note:**

> Based off this [post](http://frank-myhero-iero.tumblr.com/post/140126667689/where-is-my-johnlock-fic-where-sherlock-is-coming) from my Starbucks BFF
> 
> Not beta'd or brit-picked. All mistakes are mine. Sorry bout it.

It started with a cough.

“Is there something you’d like to say?” John asked, looking up from his newspaper.

Sherlock was sitting in his chair, laptop balanced on his knees.

“Hmm?”

“You’ve been clearing your throat for the better part of twenty minutes. Are you trying to say something?”

“Ah, no, just got a sort of…mmm,” he gestured vaguely to his throat, “thing.”

John lowered his paper.

“Are you ill?”

“No,” he scoffed, eyes flashing, before bursting into a full on coughing fit.

John sprung up from his chair and placed the back of his hand to Sherlock’s forehead.

“Are you feverish?” he asked as Sherlock’s hands halfheartedly tried to bat him away. “I know you never went to the surgery to get your flu shot. Despite the countless times I told you to.”

“John, please,” he grumbled, finally pushing the other man away. “Maybe I went and got one when you weren’t there.”

John rolled his eyes.

“No, you didn’t.”

“Oh? And how would you know?” Sherlock petulantly wrapped his arms around himself and tried to stifle another cough.

“I checked the logs for your name.”

“You did what?” Sherlock raised an eyebrow.

John lifted his chin, despite feeling heat rise to his cheeks. He wasn’t about to let Sherlock make him feel _embarrassed_ simply because he was concerned for the man’s health. He was a doctor, was he not? Just a professional concern. Completely professional.

“You never got your shot and I know for a fact that flu has been spreading down at the Yard.”

“For God’s sake, John!” He coughed for several seconds. “I’m fine.”

With that, he stomped to his bedroom, slamming the door behind him.

John threw on his jacket and grabbed his keys, grumbling about going for a walk. He was just going to take a stroll around the block, but he somehow found himself at a corner market buying sports drinks, canned soup, and ibuprofen.

***

John was kept up all night by Sherlock’s coughing from down the hall. Despite closed doors and walls between them it seemed as loud as if he were right there next to him.

“Let him suffer,” John mumbled. “Teach him to get his flu shot.”

John managed a few restless hours of sleep before finally rising far earlier than he would have liked on his day off. He stumbled into the kitchen, rubbing his eyes. As he put the kettle on there was a loud buzzing noise from somewhere behind him. Sherlock had left his mobile on the table, and it was currently blowing up with texts. John picked it up and glanced at the messages; all varying versions of “please come down to the Yard, we have a case” from Lestrade.

John knocked on Sherlock’s door once before entering.

“Sherlock, you’re mobile – oh, God.”

Sherlock was bundled as tight as possible in all of his blankets and shivering. Sweat plastered his curls to his forehead and his nose was red and running.

“Is it Lestrade? Tell him I’ll be there in a minute,” he croaked, making to move and then groaning.

“Don’t you dare.” John pointed a finger threateningly in his direction.

“But –“

“Stay.”

John left and retrieved a thermometer from the bathroom cabinet before returning to the room.

“Put this under your tongue.”

Sherlock only glared.

“Put it under your tongue,” John repeated, “or I will put it somewhere else.”

Sherlock huffed and stretched an arm out from under his blanket cocoon to take it from him.

John left again to grab a few things and when he came back Sherlock was squinting at the thermometer.

“Well?” John asked.

“I’m fine,” he answered, trying to shift farther away.

John snatched it out of his hand.

“Aaaand a fever. Like I thought. Take these and drink all of this,” he said, placing two ibuprofen tablets on his bedside table along with the sports drink.

Sherlock’s mobile buzzed in the pocket of John’s dressing gown. Lestrade was calling now. John answered before Sherlock could say anything.

“Hullo, Lestrade?”

“Sherlock, I’ve been trying – wait, John? Is that you?”

“Yes, I’m afraid Sherlock is a bit under the weather today.”

“…Is he brooding or is he actually ill?”

“It’s flu.”

“Jesus.”

“As his doctor I am forbidding contact for the next two days at least.” Sherlock opened his mouth in protest but John silenced him with a look. “He’s highly contagious.”

“Alright, well, whatever you think is best Dr. Watson,” Lestrade was pouting, but he knew better than to fight John on such matters. “Though do have him give us a ring if he feels better.”

John hung up and placed the phone back in his pocket. Sherlock was still sullenly staring at the tablets.

“Take those,” John said, more gently. “I’ll come and check on you in a bit, just try and rest.”

Sherlock managed to make his grumbling sound somewhat appreciative as John closed his bedroom door behind him.

***

John came back a few minutes later with a surgical mask on his face and a damp cloth in hand. Sherlock was already asleep, though his brow was still furrowed from pain. John tentatively sat on the edge of his bed and wiped his hair away from his face, careful not to wake him. Even without directly touching his skin John could feel the heat rising off of him, his cheeks pink with fever. John placed the cool cloth onto his forehead, and then his cheeks. Sherlock’s face began to relax and his breathing deepened.

***

Every half hour or so John would come back in with the cloth to press it against Sherlock’s forehead. Sometimes he woke up and John would encourage him to drink more fluids, but mostly he slept. After a few hours John took his temperature again. He frowned. There had been very little change. John brought Sherlock more ibuprofen and another sports drink.

Sherlock took them, more or less awake now.

“How are you feeling?” John asked.

“Head hurts. Chest hurts.” He thought for a minute. “Whole body hurts. I’m sweating but I’m freezing.”

“I know,” John consoled, “we just need to wait for your fever to break.”

John was running the cloth along Sherlock’s cheeks again. Sherlock tried to focus on John, his eyes glassy.

“What’s that on your face?” he slurred.

“It’s a mask to keep your plague away from me,” John replied, trying not to laugh at Sherlock’s slight delirium.

Sherlock stared some more.

“Don’t like it,” Sherlock decided.

“Why not?”

“Covers your mouth. I like your mouth,” he said.

John smiled. He couldn’t wait to hold this over Sherlock’s head once he was back on his feet.

“Do you now?” John asked, swiping along Sherlock’s hairline.

“I’d like to kiss it.”

John paused, his hand frozen on Sherlock’s face.

“The mask is in the way,” Sherlock explained, as if that was what John was confused about.

John swallowed, looking down at the sick man beneath him. His eyes were bloodshot, making his irises look an impossible bright blue-green. His parted lips were chapped and his face still flushed with fever.

“Perhaps when you feel better,” John heard himself say.

“Yes, perhaps,” Sherlock mumbled before falling back into a deep sleep.

***

Sherlock’s fever broke that night, but John continued to fuss over him. Forcing him to stay in bed at least another day and glaring at him until he ate some soup. John had stopped wearing the mask, but Sherlock didn’t comment on it. He probably didn’t even remember what he had said in his fever induced state. John tried not to be disappointed.

***

It ended with a kiss.

John had been in his chair, reading the morning paper, while Sherlock bustled around getting ready to leave the flat “for the first time in ages.” (It had been four days).

Suddenly John felt a hand slide along the side of his jaw, tilting his chin up to meet waiting lips. He was so surprised he forgot to kiss back.

Sherlock just looked at him, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.

“I hadn’t forgotten, you know,” he said. “I was just waiting for that damned cough to go away.”

John let his paper fall to the floor as he stood to wrap his arms around the back of Sherlock’s neck and kiss him properly. Chaste and warm and soft.

“I might still be contagious,” Sherlock teased.

“Don’t care,” John replied, breathless.

“That’s very irresponsible, Doctor –“

John closed his mouth over his again, effectively shutting him up.

**Author's Note:**

> Corrections, critiques, and songs of praise welcome!
> 
> Follow me on the tumblrverse! [edgarallanrose](http://edgarallanrose.tumblr.com/)


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